Fantasyland

I don't have any issue with Toontown, however, I do enjoy Fantasyland more. I am kind of hoping they may tear down Toontown and expand Fantasyland. Thoughts? Anyone want to entertain my wishful thinking?
I was also curious, is there a reason Mickey does not have a dark ride? Is it a rule to not feature him in the park that way?

Re: Fantasyland

Only thing I'd be worried abou with that would be roger rabbits cartoon spin. If they can re build it in DCA or even make a better roger rabbit ride I'd be totally fine with a fantasyland expansion. Maybe a sub land themed to myths and legends with Hercules,aladdin,and fantasia

Re: Fantasyland

toontown definitely needs a refurb, but i think its quintessential disney & deserves its spot in the park. also if you want a mickey dark ride, toontown would be the spot to do it. if it were up to me, i'd completely rebuild it, only keeping roger rabbit. turn the back half into a 'steamboat willie' dark ride, & the front half into less of a downtown area & more of a neighborhood area like the classic disney shorts.

if fantasyland were to expand (i don't think it should, especially since it just got the princess fantasy faire) i would expand it into the motor boats area & into the back park of the autopia space, with the rest of autopia & the lagoon going to tomorrowland &/or a discovery bay type land.

Re: Fantasyland

My guess is one day they will close Toontown...and Roger will be put in either DCA OR a third park...but one day disney will wanted to add more to Fantasyland...and toontown does not have much love..Look at Florida as proof

Re: Fantasyland

Originally Posted by StarDustFairy

I don't have any issue with Toontown, however, I do enjoy Fantasyland more. I am kind of hoping they may tear down Toontown and expand Fantasyland. Thoughts? Anyone want to entertain my wishful thinking?

I wouldn't mind them doing this, although it's unlikely given how much traffic that place always seems to get. I've hardly ever gone there, but as long as it draws a large number of guests away from the other lands, I guess it's not a complete waste of space.

Originally Posted by StarDustFairy

I was also curious, is there a reason Mickey does not have a dark ride? Is it a rule to not feature him in the park that way?

I'm not aware of any such explicit rules being in place, but historically Disneyland wasn't meant to be associated so much with cartoons and characters from Disney movies. On Dedication Day (July 17, 1955), for television there were Disney characters in the form of borrowed Ice Capades costumes (pretty cheesy ones), a Mickey Mouse plushy in the train engine with Walt, Fess Parker and Buddy Ebsen as Davy Crockett and Georgie Russel, and some "atmosphere" characters (i.e. the "natural inhabitants" of Disneyland's various realms), for example. However, for quite some time afterward only the latter remained in the park (as we saw when DCA 2.0 first opened, and we still see some of in Knott's Berry Farm), and there wasn't a cartoon-themed land where characters like Mickey, Donald, and Goofy belonged.

Obviously there were rides in Fantasyland that were based on certain Disney animated features, but they were more focused on the stories that were being told as opposed to animation. Aside from these particular rides, Disney characters were featured early on in shows, parades, and exhibits, but I don't get the sense that there was ever much of an effort to base other types of attractions, namely rides, on the early Disney cartoon characters. Walkaround characters came later, and while I'm not as familiar with the history of those, I imagine that they were in response to guest expectations, as when people go to Disneyland, many of them would expect to be able to meet Mickey Mouse, for one thing. Obviously the walkaround characters and entertainers such as musicians/singers and the Laughing Stock Co., for example, supplanted the "atmosphere" characters that used to "live" at the park.

With the later revival of animation as a celebrated art form in the late 1980s, Mickey's Toontown was created to give cartoon characters a home (literally in some cases), but there was only room/budget for one ride (besides the kiddie coaster), so Roger Rabbit got the nod and the tie-in because the movie Who Framed Roger Rabbit was really the inspiration for the new land as a whole. A Mickey ride might be neat, but a lot of things happen or don't happen because of timing and circumstances, as well as whatever ideas happen to come along, and as explained above Disneyland was not originally viewed by Walt and others who created it as a place inhabited by cartoon characters per se.

Re: Fantasyland

Originally Posted by jasmineray

NO! Toontown is one of the best themed lands in the entire park... It just needs a huge paint job and another attraction.

I agree. My family never goes to Toontown, not because of a lack of theme but because it lacks rides. Rodger while fun is not enough to justify going into a dead end corner of the park. It is the same issue Bear Country had before Splash Mountain opened. However if their was a solid E-ticket in the land I would move heaven and earth to make it to Toontown.

Re: Fantasyland

Originally Posted by xboxtravis7992

I agree. My family never goes to Toontown, not because of a lack of theme but because it lacks rides. Rodger while fun is not enough to justify going into a dead end corner of the park. It is the same issue Bear Country had before Splash Mountain opened. However if their was a solid E-ticket in the land I would move heaven and earth to make it to Toontown.

Exactly. A Fun, classic Mickey cartoon ride would be lots of fun. Toontown is supposed to be take place in the 30s or 40s anyway, classic Mickey would be great.

Re: Fantasyland

I agree that Toontown needs all the help it can get, but I disagree that it needs to be removed. In the first place, it's a cute concept, and it's supposed to be where Mickey "lives". I'm still trying to get over Mickey losing his "vacation home" at WDW (see this thread for example: Why are Mickey Mouse-themed areas expendable?).

There are some attraction spaces, however, that are pretty much dead and can use something new. Again, I created a thread, but no one seemed to show interest in it (this link is from an attempted update): Mickey's Toontown updates (part deux).

Anyway, in my plan, the Roger Rabbit ride and Mickey and Minnie's respective houses will remain, but everything between Mickey's house and Goofy's Bounce House/Playhouse will be removed. That means goodbye Chip 'n' Dale's Treehouse, Gadget's Go Coaster and Donald's Boat! Oh, and Goofy's Bounce House/Playhouse will be completely gutted as well.

First, the aspects of Donald's Boat and Gadget's Go Coaster will be a new roller coaster with a Donald theme, the queue being Donald's new house (a boathouse, I think it looks like), which will now look something like this:

The queue winds through Donald's new house. It will feature several interactive elements. One is a rope based on the one you can pull in the queue of the Indiana Jones ride (a sign nearby tells you not to do it). You pull on that and a British-sounding man yells at you for doing so. You can pull on this rope in this queue and hear Donald yelling at you for doing so. There is also a radio in the corner, too, again set to the radio station of Toontown. Also in the queue is this big map on the wall, looking like this one in WDW's now-extinct Toontown Fair (in fact, maybe Disneyland can claim ownership of the real deal here):

As for the roller coaster aspect, it will be something of a cross between a seaplane and an airboat, which you can also look up on here. The new roller coaster will be called Donald's Air Academy. (perhaps in deference to Goofy's Sky School at the California Adventure).

The roller coaster train looks like a cross between an airboat and the Spruce Goose. It will look like a boat, but have its wings on the bow, a propeller on the front and a tail with an airboat propeller on the back. Along the bottom of the boat-plane would be a huge rubber raft-like thing (at least that's how it's supposed to look), making it also something like a hovercraft. It could be something like how in "Plane Crazy", Mickey made up his plane from a car. As if named after the Spruce Goose, the plane in the new ride will be called the Drake (as in "Von Drake", suggesting that Ludwig Von Drake made this for Donald) D-34 Swooper, or commonly called the Deciduous Duck (since the Spruce Goose was largely made of wood). Thus, the makeshift flying boat/seaplane/airboat craft would be called the Deciduous Duck. Also, the craft will be painted in the Donald color scheme: blue, yellow and white. There are also a set of blueprints for this new craft along the back wall of the queue.

Okay, now that we got the description of the roller coaster train out of the way, let's move on. The roller coaster will fly up and over a new Toon lake, dodging characters try to take aim at you with water, such as spitting frogs perched on the rocks (they're actually the same ones previously used in Gadget's Go Coaster) or Donald's nephews, Huey, Dewey and Louie, all scattered about the lake and firing water cannons at you. There's also Goofy in a boat, trying to fish. He's caught a bite, but the fish in question is dragging his line along and spinning his boat around. This boat accidentally kicks up water in your path. The idea is that Donald, as part of his service, is having you take out his new Deciduous Duck aircraft for a test flight, but it seems that there are more than a few bugs to work out, and Donald's signature short temper to try and get it working (hence the roller coaster part).

Well, that's basically the new roller coaster at Mickey's Toontown, combining things from Donald's Boat and Gadget's Go Coaster. Similar to the Great Goofini coaster at WDW, Donald's Air Academy may or may not have Fastpass. Like its predecessor, Gadget's Go Coaster, it will also be sponsored by Sparkle paper towels.

Next time, I will get to the idea I have for replacing Goofy's Bounce House/Playhouse. Until then, thoughts, comments, concerns?

Re: Fantasyland

Originally Posted by xboxtravis7992

I agree. My family never goes to Toontown, not because of a lack of theme but because it lacks rides. Rodger while fun is not enough to justify going into a dead end corner of the park. It is the same issue Bear Country had before Splash Mountain opened. However if their was a solid E-ticket in the land I would move heaven and earth to make it to Toontown.

True. There are major crowd magnets at two of the geographical extremes of the park with Space Mountain and Splash Mountain and absolutely nothing "magnetic" in the very back.

Re: Fantasyland

Originally Posted by Disneylandfan85

Anyway, in my plan, the Roger Rabbit ride and Mickey and Minnie's respective houses will remain, but everything between Mickey's house and Goofy's Bounce House/Playhouse will be removed. That means goodbye Chip 'n' Dale's Treehouse, Gadget's Go Coaster and Donald's Boat! Oh, and Goofy's Bounce House/Playhouse will be completely gutted as well.

Those are some fun ideas! I like your Donald coaster idea. I think it could be quite charming. It sounds more engaging than the Go Coaster. I don't really have any strong ideas. Mostly just the vague desire for something with a little more "spark" in it than the, in my opinion, somewhat flat note that is Toontown.

Originally Posted by DobbysCloset

Methinks that because most of the participants here are grown-ups (or at least tall enough to drive at Autopia), we discount the value of Toontown, Bug's Land and even Fantasy Faire.

Just the thought of removing Toontown makes me feel like some evil landlord wants to evict Mickey Mouse!

Haha! Poor Mickey Mouse! I didn't even think of it like that.

I was just thinking about attractions I'd like to see in Fantasyland, and unfortunately there isn't much room. Toontown is a nice idea, and it is colorful and vibrant. The odd thing to me is that despite that, Toontown is pretty dull and underwhelming. It seems like it should be really fun and full of energy, but when I'm back there I feel like taking a nap. It is true, I am an adult, but I am also very much a child at heart, so I don't think it's an age issue for me.

Mainly I was thinking about giving Mary Poppins proper treatment and giving her a more detailed and immersive attraction, and changing the theme of the Jolly Holiday bakery to something less fantastical. Not that I have a problem with the bakery exactly, I just think that it isn't the best representation for what Mary Poppins deserves, and while I find it "acceptable" on Main Street, it does give me the vibe that it's not quite in the right place. I feel it weakens both Main Street and Mary Poppins a bit.

I was also thinking about how the Dwarf Mine Train ride seems like a pretty cool coaster, and that I am interested in having something similar in Disneyland. Granted, I really don't know a lot about it, most of what I am excited about is my own imagining of what I hope it's like. I suppose I'm also being a bit selfish, I want to go on that ride, but I'd rather not have to go all the way to Florida to do so. :-P

I was thinking about still having Mickey featured back there, but instead of just the meet and greet, a Mickey Mouse dark ride. If space permits, I was also thinking about still offering the meet and greet at the end of the ride. Maybe even a few different paths to take like the system they have implemented at PFF to hlep move things a bit quicker. Roger Rabbit, I think, could still have a ride back there. The outside display would need to be altered to fit the new look, though.

Re: Fantasyland

No need to change Toontown. A nice, thorough paint job and another attraction will do the trick. Toontown is way too detailed and highly themed to get rid of. I can see why Florida got rid of theirs, but we don't need to get rid of ours.

Personally, I don't want any cloned attractions from Florida in Disneyland. Let Florida have the Mine Train, as they need it. We need more original ideas, not clones.

Re: Fantasyland

Methinks that because most of the participants here are grown-ups (or at least tall enough to drive at Autopia), we discount the value of Toontown, Bug's Land and even Fantasy Faire.

Just the thought of removing Toontown makes me feel like some evil landlord wants to evict Mickey Mouse!

Just because an attraction has value for children doesn't mean it should get a free pass if it offers little to nothing for adults. Attractions can be captivating for all ages if done correctly. I think the best example of this is the majority of Fantasyland attractions, primarily the dark rides, which, although relatively simple, manage to create a captivating experience for both children and their parents.